In 1849 Elizabeth Rigby married Sir Charles Eastlake, president of the Royal Academy, Director of the National Gallery, and first President of the Royal Photographic Society. She became an author and critic, and in 1857 she published a groundbreaking article, "Photography," one of the first histories of the medium that also championed photography as a fine art.
Eastlake wrote: "It is now more than fifteen years ago that specimens of a new and mysterious art were first exhibited to our wondering gaze...we examined them with the keenest admiration, and felt that the spirit of Rembrandt had revived."